The emerging trend of social software technology can address many different second language (L2) learner needs through authentic social interaction and a variety of scaffolding processes. Social software connects education with real‐life learning and interests, and engages and motivates students. It can facilitate learning environments that are more learner‐centre...

This paper reviews current research findings on how specific learning difficulties (SLDs) impact on the processes of multilingual language development. The review includes studies of young language learners in instructed classroom settings as well as of multilingual children in second language contexts. The paper starts with a definition of the concepts of disability and SLDs. Next, it discusse...

The DigLin project aims at providing concrete solutions for low-literate and illiterate adults who have to learn a second language (L2). Besides learning the L2, they thus also have to acquire literacy in the L2. To allow intensive practice and feedback in reading aloud, appropriate speech technology is developed for the four targeted languages: Dutch, English, German and Finnish. Since relativ...

Computational models of reading posit that there are two pathways to word recognition, using sublexical phonology or morphological/orthographic information. They further theorize that everyone uses both pathways to some extent, but the division of labor between the pathways can vary. This review argues that the first language one was taught to read, and the instructional method by which one was...

For teacher educators, genre-based pedagogies offer a valuable resource for assisting both preand inservice writing instructors to assist their students to produce effective and relevant texts. Instead of focusing on the process of composition, the content of texts, or the abstract prescriptions of disembodied grammars, genre pedagogies enable teachers to ground their courses in the texts that ...

Using the World Wide Web (hereinafter the ‘Web’) has become an increasingly viable way to source information in academic writing. However, the Web is a fundamentally different type of resource from conventional sources such as books and journals. This paper argues that there is a need among learners for a heightened critical awareness of web-source nuances. Specifically, although the Web contai...

Adopting the methods of multimodal conversation analysis, this study demonstrates that adult second language (L2) users with emergent literacy formulate requests as ‘complex Gestalts’ consisting prototypically deictic or depictive gestures combined gaze, situationally relevant material, and vocal linguistic resources. The data obtained for are from classroom interactions out-of-class service en...

In this comparative systematic review, we analyse how the use of digital games inside and outside school settings might support primary secondary students’ literacy language learning in relation to first (L1) second (L2) educational contexts. Our findings indicate widely different patterns from utilising diverse game aspects, theories, research methodologies two subject areas, which show that t...